Christian jumped at that last part of the last sentence of yesterday's post. What does it mean? How do people do it?
My first thought at his reaction was that that could be a sentence hiding at least one and possibly more research papers. There has to be a million different ways of doing it, most of them probably better than the very porous boundaries I have set for myself right now. People have been saying this for ages, of course, that a problem of the pandemic and remote work in general is that the borders between work and not work become very fuzzy. Sometimes you just need things put in a slightly different way to to reinforce and clarify the point again.
Fuzzy borders are seductive. No, I do not really need to fully apply myself to this one thing just yet, I can glance at it while I keep doing this other thing. It feels a bit freeing to not have a clear border, and to not be forced to create one. And sure, sometimes a good balance will appear naturally. But certainly not all the time.
This morning feels calmer and clearer thanks to these thoughts from yesterday. I am not doing things much different from yesterday - tea is on the table, dog snoozing on my lap, blog post being written - but I did spend a little time actively thinking about what I am doing, and the path to here from the alarm going off was pretty focused.
The next step - after I finish this and post it - will be to move down to the office, open up the work computer, and try to work through the reminders I left for myself yesterday rather than getting lost in other random thoughts and readings.
(Got lost in random thoughts.)
Hey everybody, we are back!
I think what a good morning transition could use for me is a few moments of actively thinking about work before really starting it. The classic Getting things done-ism of needing to not think when things start happening; you need to already have thought.
Say five minutes of just going through my own thoughts and notes before starting to look at any new input. Sounds good?
Yes, this is also extremely classic. A small step on the way which leads to some people leaving their phones in flight mode all the way to noon, communication apps locked away in a chest under the bed, merrily hammering on whatever tasks they set up for themselves the last time they thought.
I will try not to get that far ahead of myself. At least not right now.
Five minutes.